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US air strikes help Iraq army to secure key Mosul dam

Kurdish and Iraqi forces dealt Islamic State (IS) militants a severe blow by recapturing the Mosul Dam on Monday.

The dam, which supplies power and water to a large part of Northern Iraq, was considered a target of paramount strategic importance in the fight against the Sunni militants, who had taken control of the facility earlier in August.

The attack on the dam was conducted with the help of US fighters and bombers that carried out air strikes targeting IS positions near the levee, the Pentagon said.

"This operation demonstrates that Iraqi and Kurdish forces are capable of working together in taking the fight to IS, and if they continue to do so they will have the strong support of the United States of America," Obama told a press conference.

"The failure of the Mosul Dam could threaten the lives of large numbers of civilians, threaten US personnel and facilities - including the US Embassy in Baghdad - and prevent the Iraqi government from providing critical services to the Iraqi populace," a US official said.

"Taking the dam took longer than expected because Islamic State had planted land mines," Hoshiyar Zebari, a top Kurdish official, was quoted as saying by Reuters.

The Iraqi army and counter-terrorism units are now determined to carry their momentum forward, as they seek to deal more blows to IS militants.

"The new tactic of launching a quick attack shrouded by secrecy proved successful and we are determined to keep following the new assault tactics with help of intelligence provided by Americans," Sabah Nouri, a spokesman for Iraq's counter-terrorism unit, told Reuters news agency.

"The next stop will be Mosul."

Reuters, however, reported that a dam employee insisted that the IS militants were still in full control of the dam's facilities.

The critical piece of infrastructure, built under Saddam Hussein's orders in the late 1980s, has repeatedly come under scrutiny by engineers, while a Washington Post report from 2006 called it "the most dangerous dam in the world".

The dam, located 250 miles away from Baghdad, is 2.2-mile wide and holds 12bn cubic metres of water.

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